METEOR (1979)

A pissed off comet punches a large asteroid in the nuts and now that 5-mile-wide sucker (plus various smaller fragments) is going to hit the Earth in 6 days! Ahh, crap. Luckily, the Americans have a top-secret satellite with 14 nuclear missiles on it. Unfortunately, 14 missiles isn’t enough to stop the asteroid from evolving into a…meteor!!!

On paper, METEOR sounds like a promising film: exciting story (anything about shit crashing into the Earth is awesome); a cast full of well-known faces (at least for the time) and a respectable budget of $16 million (remember ALIEN came out the same year and only cost $11 million). But on paper doesn’t guarantee on-screen excellence. Nope. I have no clue what happened in the making of this clunker, but METEOR is a goddamn turd! I haven’t been this disappointed since the last time I walked into a Best Buy.

The story takes off quickly enough with Hercules satellite designer Sean Connery being informed of the asteroid and put in charge of getting Hercules ready to blast that global killing son of a bitch out of the sky. At the same time, US President Henry Fonda gets Russia to admit that they also have a top-secret satellite armed with nuclear missiles. So the Russians send over a scientist and Sean Connery immediately starts trying to bang interpreter Natalie Wood. Motherfucker, ain’t you got better shit to focus on?! Blah, blah, blah, it goes on and on with all kinds of conversations and romance and bickering. Fuck me. I just want to see some sappy ass heroics and shit blowing up. And don’t even get me started on the special effects. Buck Rogers in the 25th Century looked better.

Long story, short: METEOR is mildly entertaining and fun to laugh at, but if you’re looking for an actually good late-1970’s asteroid story then A FIRE IN THE SKY would be a better bet. Or, you could always just say fuck it and watch ARMAGEDDON again for the hundredth time.

WEST SIDE STORY (1961)

Russ Tamblyn (eight years before getting promoted to being the leader of the Satans in SATAN'S SADISTS) is the leader of the Jets.  A small "American" gang that has a rivalry with a gang of Puerto Rican immigrants called the Sharks.  Both gangs are based out of the Lincoln Square neighborhood in Manhattan and are constantly at each others throat.  Things go from bad to worse though when the sister (Natalie Wood) of the Sharks leader falls in love with the ex-leader (Richard Beymer) of the Jets.  Things really go south when people start stabbing each other to death!

WEST SIDE STORY can best be described as Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" modernized as a "juvenile delinquency" film (they were popular in the late '50's/early '60's) and told through lots of awesome song and dance numbers...my personal favorite being "America".

Anybody interested with American musicals needs to watch WEST SIDE STORY.  Not only is it a very interesting time capsule into the early 1960's, but the music, dancing, singing and choreography are all simply amazing.  And let's not forget the colors and the cinematography!  And the cast!

Oh well, I could keep going on and on about how much I enjoy WEST SIDE STORY, but I think it'd be best if you just go watch it for yourself.  Have fun and remember to be cool, boy.  Breeze it, buzz it, easy does it.  Just play it cool, boy, real cool!